Lamont Dozier was born in Detroit in 1941 and spent the late 1950s and early 1960s recording for small independent Detroit labels without a hit. In 1962 he joined brothers Brian and Eddie Holland to form Holland-Dozier-Holland at Motown, with a strict split of duties: Dozier and Brian Holland built the tracks as arrangers and producers while Eddie Holland handled lyrics and vocal production. Heat Wave and Quicksand for Martha and the Vandellas came in 1963, and Where Did Our Love Go in 1964 started a run of 10 number one pop hits for the Supremes in about three years. In total Dozier is credited here with 14 number one pop hits, yet he could walk down a street largely unrecognized.
In 1968 the trio left Motown to found Invictus and Hot Wax, producing Freda Payne’s Band of Gold plus hits for the Honey Cone and Chairman of the Board. Dozier broke from the Hollands in 1973 to go solo, replaced by Harold Beatty, and scored with Fish Ain’t Bitin’ and Trying to Hold On to My Woman. In the 1980s he wrote Invisible for Alison Moyet, co-wrote with Mick Hucknall for Simply Red, and teamed with Phil Collins on Two Hearts for the film Buster. He was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1990, taught at USC’s Thornton School of Music from 2008, and died in Arizona in August 2022 at 81.
- His own single Why Can’t We Be Lovers reached number 9 on the Billboard R&B chart while he was running his own labels.
- In 1975 he wrote and sang the vocal theme for the ABC sitcom That’s My Mama in its second season.
- Going Back to My Roots, released in 1977, later became an international hit in a cover by Odyssey, and UK DJ Robbie Vincent championed his solo work.
- Two Hearts won a Golden Globe, tied with Carly Simon’s Let the River Run, plus a Grammy and an Academy Award nomination; Loco in Acapulco from the same film went to the Four Tops.
- His 1987 love theme Without You for Leonard Part 6, sung by Peabo Bryson and Regina Belle, was adapted in Portuguese and Spanish as Amor Dividido.
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